UNBC Past President’s Expenses Under Fire
Prince George, B.C.- The Canadian Taxpayers Federation has labeled UNBC’s past President as the second worst in B.C. when it comes to expenses.
In a report released today, the Canadian Taxpayer’s Federation Director Jordan Bateman says too many heads of post secondary institutions are spending way too much money.
UNBC’s previous President George Iwama is listed as second worst in the Province, having spent $126,131.26 in the fiscal year ending March 31, 2013, and nearly $100 thousand more from April 1st of 2013 to December 31st of that year.
UNBC’s Vice President External Relations, Rob Van Adrichem says the numbers are no surprise “We have been publishing this information for a couple of years” says Van Adrichem “We posted the details on our website this summer and plan to continue to do that in the future.”
Van Adrichem says the high expenses are in part a consequence of the University’s location and the University’s mission, or what it’s trying to do. With satellite campuses throughout the North and an expectation the President would attend meetings in Vancouver and Victoria, the expense list shows about $17 thousand dollars was spent on local and regional trips. “In terms of specifics where the President travelled to Asia, Japan especially, on a couple of occasions were covered by research grants that he had, a couple of others were on University expenses, and a couple of examples were for University of the Arctic, which took him to Greenland, Iceland, Russia and I think for George in particular, he saw it very important to maintain our connections around the North. UNBC was one of the founding four of the University of the Arctic and he was very keen to restore our level of engagement with that organization.” That travel may have boosted UNBC’s profile enough to have it host a conference last spring with Arctic researchers attending.
Iwama also nurtured ties with Universities in Japan, relationships which required his traveling there, and which resulted in more than 600 students from Japan attending UNBC for a variety of programs.
The other question raised by the Taxpayers Federation is that UNBC picked up the tab for the President’s wife to accompany him on those journeys. “It’s important to note that each of those instances where Marilyn accompanied George, the Chair of the Board of Governor’s approved the expenditure before the trip was taken.” Van Adrichem is quick to point out that Marilyn Iwama was a strong ambassador for the University, the City and the region “Sometimes, the President’s spouse is requested to attend meetings or events and the President’s spouse is also a University Ambassador, I think Marilyn was particularly passionate and eloquent in her support of the University, the community, the region I think she was a very strong ambassador.”
The President’s salary and expenditures are reviewed annually by the Board of Governors.
The full Taxpayers Federation report can be accessed here.
Editor’s note:
This story has been corrected to clarify that it is the Chair of the Board of Governors, not the Board , that approves travel expenses for a spouse.
Comments
So, if this is a serious issue, why hasn’t a complaint been made to the RCMP? Why is there no forensic audit?
Another sad excuse to spend money without accountability. ‘IT WAS FOR THE GOOD OF THE SCHOOL!” lol, suckers.
The question is not about how much money was spent, but whether the expenses were appropriate for the position.
Grizzly2 you must be made of money , lets have an AUDIT or a inquire lets blow another $ 1000.000.00 Guys like you make me want to puke…
Seems these high priced people we hire don’t want to stay here for long.
When they first come, they fawn all over us, and tell us what a great City we have, how much they love being here, and how humbled they are to be heading up such a great University. Then a few years down the road they are G.O.N.E. Probably sitting is Japan and laughing like hell.
Iwama was born in Naha Okinawa, and left when he was 17. He spent time in North America at different Universities, before he came to Prince George. He has a PHD in Zoology from the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology.
He maintained professional ties to Okinawa, serving on External Advisory Committees, at the University of Ryukyus.
Was he attending these Committee’s while working for UNBC??
Seems a great coincidence that he ended up getting a job at the University in his home town.
Rob Van Andrichem can spin this any way he wants, but the bottom line is, it doesn’t look good.
George Iwama received his Ph.D. in 1986 from UBC, not the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology. His dissertation was entitled “Strategies for acid-base regulation in fishes”.
The kinds of external advisory committees and the like that he was on are quite normal in academia and do not indicate that he was not doing his job at UNBC or that he was looking for a job in Japan.
There is one potentially important point being missed in what Rob van Adrichem said, namely that some of his travel was paid out of research grants. That is money that does not come out of the UNBC budget. Before judging, I would want to see how the expenses break down.
There has been no complaint to the RCMP and no forensic audit ordered (LOL) because there’s nothing illegal here. Read the article, its merely a watchdog group commenting on information that has been public from day one.
Palopu: “Seems these high priced people we hire don’t want to stay here for long.” Ha ha, what’s this WE stuff, you sir need to be reminded that you work at a pulp mill and know nothing about how these people are chosen. Al you know is how to complain about others and what they do.
Here’s a thought: Maybe… a still young university in the middle of nowhere is considered a stepping stone in careers of people with an ultimate goal. AND maybe… this university had to work harder than most long established universities in major cities to attract students. This May be a reason for the high expenses. Maybe.
I found the breakdowns:
2013
2012
Unfortunately, they don’t indicate which expenses came out of the UNBC budget and which out of research grants.
Here’s Iwama’s dissertation.
Welll His wife is a package deal in a position such as his. yesss he has helped bring a lot of International students over that help pay for the University and also boost the economy. Hundred twenty six grand is not that far fetched
Billposer. Your right. He got this PHD at UBC. His new job is Executive Vice President, of Okinawa Institute of Science & Technology. He did however maintain ties to Okinawa, serving on external advisory committee’s at the University of Ryukyus, while working a UNBC/.
Although Rob Van Andrichem states that some of these expenses were from research grants, he failed to give us a dollar figure.
VestedInterest. Your full of maybe’s to-day. Iwama’s application for the job of President of UNBC was among over 100 others. He was short listed to four, and then ultimately hired. The process used to hire these people is about as flawed as you can get. A series of meeting by various committee’s, who hum, and haw, and pontificate, and finally make a decision, which 9 times out of 10 turns out to be the wrong one. Have we forgotten about Mr Cozzetti already.???
Have you overlooked the fact that enrolments actually declined during Iwama’s term. Money well spent???
Considering that Universities are for the most part run on tax dollars, I suggest to you that I and any other tax paying citizen has the right to complain how this money is spent. I realize of course that some people, believe that the elite on the top of the hill, knows what’s best, and that we at the bottom of the hill should just go along with whatever tripe comes from behind the veil of academia.
Seems to me Iwama chose a Vice Presidents position in his home town over a Presidents position at UNBC. Hmmmm. Step up, or step down?
In many universities, the Provost/(Executive) Vice-President is the top position really involved in running the university and in academics. The President deals mostly with the external relations of the university: politics and fund-raising. If that is the case at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology, I can see someone who is more interested in the kind of work than in the nominal prestige of the position preferring the VP position. One way in which Iwama differs from a lot of senior administrators is that he has kept his hand in research. Charles Jago, for example, moved into administration very early in his career and at least judging from his publications ceased to do much historical research. Jago’s shift was unusually early, but that pattern is pretty common. Iwama seems to have continued to do research and as I recall expressed a desire to have more time for it.
And it is quite understandable that someone who has spent nearly his entire adult life abroad might at this point in his life enjoy returning to his home. So, without knowing Iwama’s thinking, I don’t find his decision odd or troubling.
I don’t find his decision odd or troubling either. However it appears that Prince George was just a stop on the road on his way home. We then are left with finding yet another President. Hopefully the present one will stick around for a while.
In any event the issue here is the spending on travel. Seems pretty high to me, however what do I know, I work at a pulp mill.
As long as the (not too extravagant) expenditures were beneficial to his career and at the same time even much more beneficial to UNBC I am not worried.
I support the travel and I support the inclusion of his wife. This is a healthy way to run any organization and I applaud those in a position to authorize these expenses. If they were approved ahead of time, all the better.
They are Ambassadors for UNBC and need to have the flexibility to do that. The other issue is can we afford it. Those responsible for managing the finances are held accountable for spending.
They didn’t do anything wrong. Everything was approved. So, what’s the problem?
The bottom line is this. What was the fruit from this investment? If the fruit is measurable and visible, then the cost may justify the expense. 600 students from Japan is fruit. Figure it out.
You always have to spend money to make money. It needs to be justified and someone needs to be accountable. I don’t see any problems here.
I understand that there is the need to travel with the position. Since the travel is paid mostly with public funds they should be flying NOT in first class or staying in the best hotels. They should receive a base amout and pay for any upgrades themselves. That’s what all employees that travel on tax dollars should be doing. Also if your family travels with you, pay it yourself.
Palopu: “I don’t find his decision odd or troubling either. However it appears that Prince George was just a stop on the road on his way home. We then are left with finding yet another President. Hopefully the present one will stick around for a while. ”
Funny with all of the perks and benefits of the position that it seems hard to attract good people to the position for any length of time. That could be due to a number of reasons, but it has to be the challenging task of promoting a University which has a hard time growing the student base. Maybe it’s not all about salary and perks?
Like it or not, UNBC is a very small player in a very competitive marketplace. The challenges that any President would face aren’t going away any time soon.
Jordan Bateman hmmmm…Is he not the same man that wrote an article saying that Green saved us all when SHE negotiated the city union contract?
guesswhat … good point, puts a different light on his analysis regarding this issue, eh?
The question that the reporter should have asked Rob was how Iwama’s annual expenses compared with with the previous UNBC presidents’ expenses and how much was theirs?
UNBC has needlessly ‘prosecuted’ some of its faculty members on suspicion of spending less than 2000$ from their research grants on research travels. If a professor has paid the ticket of his wife even from his research grant in UNBC, he will be asked to return the money and he will be reprimanded. Is Iwama being asked to return the money now? It is UNBC’s Mark Duffey’s moment.
But this is just the tiny tip of the financial mismanagement in UNBC. UNBC has been receiving for a decade extra funding for extra 300-600 FTE students which are not attending UNBC. That is $4-7 Million annual waste. Multiply it by 10 for the past 10 years and we are talking about $ 40-50 Million Dollars of BC tax money wasted. The Canadian Taxpayers Federation should open an inquiry into this wasted 50 Million Dollars in UNBC now and stop the waste asap.
A taxpayer funded institution wasting taxpayer’s money? Everyone sounds so surprised.
We can complain about the universities spending and their funding. I agree “maybe” his spending is out of line but imaging PG without UNBC. No medical program, no cancer clinic, No university hospital, no MBA program and many of our bright young people would be gone. We would be a ghost town. We also have many foreign student studying here, which add to our economy. Prince George has been indeed fortunate because of UNBC.
I am not sure if he spent too much or not. If so let’s move forward and take some measures to ensure it does not happen again. Most people in PG don’t appreciate that we should be a ghost town with 50,000 people or less but we have managed to survive in spite of major changes to the local economy.
I might get slammed for what I just said that is fine. Let’s start defending this city, which should be an example of how to have city which is way too big, in area for it’s population; has had zero growth since the 80’s maybe longer, depends on which figures you look at, and still we survive.
A major reason we are NOT a ghost town is NOT to because of the city management; it is because of people in the city, getting together and making it work, which by all accounts, it should not have.
Let’t try to get the crap out of the news and start celebrating the real success we have had and our amazing people. Even the one’s we disagree with.
600 students from Japan? He was only president for a few years… The overall student population at the PG campus is about 3500. I doubt there’s been 600 students coming from Japan
Those who claim that Iwama travelled in inappropriate luxury need to be specific about their complaints. Glancing over the expense reports, I don’t see a lot of expenditures that look wonky – there aren’t any $1000 a day limousines there. There is the question of under what circumstances the university should pay for the President’s spouse to accompany him. Other than that, the main thing that strikes me is that some of the airfares to Vancouver are rather high. If those were first class fares or charters, the question of inappropriate luxury arises. I wonder, however, if they are perhaps not due to last minute ticket purchases, in which case the problem may be a staff member doing a poor job of making travel arrangements.
If I were looking at trimming expenditures at UNBC, I would look at administrative bloat and whether some programs and individual faculty are not of dubious value.
With regard to PGGUYY’s point, I don’t think that anyone would argue that UNBC has not been a benefit to the city and the region. My own feeling is that the university administration has been far from stellar and that the success of UNBC is due much more to the vision of people in the community and to the work of the rank-and-file faculty and staff of UNBC than to the administration.
PGGUYY. What has the University got to do with the Cancer Clinic??
Why would we not have a hospital??? Don’t forget that we had the Prince George Regional Hospital, and changed the name to the infamous University Hospital of Northern BC. This was a name change only. Nothing significant.
When referring to UNBC as being a success, you need to keep in mind the definition of success. There are many interpretations, however a University with flat lined enrolments, and many years of overfunding by the Province cannot be construed as a success.
We have the University here, and have to make the best of it, however lets not get carried away. Many people in North Central BC got a University Education long before UNBC showed up, and they would have continued to get a degree, had UNBC not been built.
If you want to defend the City, then quit pretending that we could not survive without UNBC. We could, and if they continue to operate at a huge loss, and enrolments continue to decline, we might just have to.
I suspect that at some point in the not too distant future, UNBC and CNC will be joined into one entity. Much like they have done in other areas of the Province.
We do not have the population in North Central BC to sustain a full blown University, never did, and if population projections are accurate never will.
I also question the figure of 600 Japanese Students. I think they meant that 600 Japanese students visited the University, not enrolled.
Have they thought to hire someone Local?? That might care about the City and do just as good a job?
Palopu, PG might have been a purely backwoods mill town back in the 60’s and 70’s, however things have changed since then. The City has evolved and UNBC has been a big part of the evolution. Your denial and downplaying doesn’t change that.
Palopu…you must be the only human in PG that doesn’t think that UNBC has been and will continue to be a positive influence on both the economy and the general well being of our city!
Prince George before UNBC was always on a boom and bust cycle of some sort due to our heavy reliance on the forest industry and spin offs for a huge percentage of the employment in the region. Since the arrival of UNBC the economy here has diversified immensely to the point that during the last major downturn in the forest industry Prince George did not become a ghost town as so many towns did.
Certainly all of that improvement is not due to the arrival of UNBC but I would argue that UNBC was the impetus for a lot of people and different types of businesses locating and thriving in good old Prince George. For a more immediate and understandable benefit just ask the thousands of students that have gone to UNBC and received their degrees without ever having to leave home! Do you think those families saved a few bucks sending their kids to school here rather than the lower mainland??
I guess if it had been a creation of the NDP, you might be a little more positive about the existence of UNBC, but on this score I can assure you that you are part of a very small minority that are not thankful that we have UNBC in our midst!
PGGUYY. What has the University got to do with the Cancer Clinic??
A major reason we have the Cancer Clinic is because we can staff it with qualified people. I may be wrong but many were attracted to the city for two reasons. We have a medical program, they can be part of that. We also have a University Hospital. I suspect you have not realized the significance of that but it literally bring in millions to the region for research, not sure if they are there yet but I suspect soon they will be. This may only be significant to you if you have to go to the hospital and don’t want to go to a rundown place for treatment.
The university hospital also brings in higher quality doctors to the region as they can teach and do research again more money to the region. This money would not come in without the University here.
Again you can slam the university for a flat line enrolment but maybe appreciate the value of your home is related to the offshoot from the university. Professors and researchers to not by at the low end of the market. I suspect they would buy a home like yours.
We are in a city in transition. In 20 years from now everyone will research how we did it. The core is the resilience of the people who got the university going. We are no longer a just a milltown.
Your property tax, you think they are high now, let the academics leave and we are all hooped. I will likely leave as well as I hire the students. (some might say a good thing. lol)
The performance of Iwama in UNBC was not good, it didn’t get a mark of A, or B or even C or D. The pass to failure of Iwama started when his first executive decision was firing the popular sport guy in UNBC instead of demoting him. I talked with him right after firing McNamara and it was as if he has achieved something in UNBC. He asked me “what do you think of it?” What did I think then? You come as an immigrant and the people of this small town give you the life time opportunity to become their university president and you fire the sport coach of their school children, “in day one”? That was my thoughts which I didn’t share with him.
Let me burst your bubbles, the total number of full time international students in UNBC is 194 in 2013-14 according to unbc official report in http://www.unbc.ca/sites/default/files/sections/institutional-research/reports/fteunbcprogram.pdf
and the total no of full time international (grad and undergrad) students in UNBC is less than 400.
The above report mentions the total full time student enrollment FTE in UNBC in 2013-14 as 3027 and in 2008-2009 when Iwama/Dale were hired as 3153 FTE. The performance failure (i.e F mark) is given because of the reduction of the UNBC enrollment under Iwama/Dale administration by 125 students.
According to another report: unbc.ca/assets/finance/budgets/final_scub_report_2012_copy1.pdf
“Our total [UNBC] enrolment target (2010/11), as set by the Provincial
Government, was 3,431 (including Nursing and Health Sciences) full time equivalent student numbers, whereas our total actual enrolment for 10/11 was 3,087 FTE resulting in a gap of 18%. UNBC is now facing a gap of 700 FTE. At the undergraduate level, the gap between target and actual enrolment is even larger (22%). Provincial Government funding is based on targeted numbers, not actual numbers; for that reason UNBC has
received funding based on 3,431 FTE.”
UNBC is now facing a gap of more than 700 FTE because the international students in the above figures of 3153 (08/09), 3087 (in 10/11) and 3027 (in 13/14) are not included in the calculation of the actual UNBC enrloments for funding purposes. 750 multiplied by BC funding rate per FTE for UNBC (at $13700) and UNBC is short of 10 Million Dollars ‘annually’ in its operational budget.
The Iwamas are now history and the reporter in this town should be asking the new UNBC new president Dr weeks about this 10 Million $ annual deficit and whether UNBC has backtracked in its decision in letting go of Dr Mark Dale, despite his F mark in enrollments.
gwf, all |I gotta say is open your eyes and see, open your ears and listen.
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